Find Yourself a Hot Bath

In Sylvia Plath's The Bell Jar, the protagonist, Esther, comes home from a night out and feels miserable between the drinks she had, the long walk home, and the depression brought on by her loneliness.

How did she make herself feel better?

A hot bath.

"There must be a few things a hot bath won't cure, but I don't know many of them," she explains before she sinks into the tub.

Scientifically, of course, there's nothing special about a hot bath. But when you hear Esther explain what it does for her, you can't help but wonder if she's describing a spiritual ceremony and not a simple bath.

"I don't believe in baptism or the waters of Jordan or anything like that, but I guess I feel about a hot bath the way those religious people feel about holy water," she says later on.

She then goes on to describe how every one of her worries begins to dissolve the further she gets into the bath, and I couldn't help but make a sudden realization:

Writing is my Hot Bath.

When I feel too stimulated, too wound up, and too worried about everyone and everything, I turn to writing.

I feel about writing the way those religious people feel about holy water.

It's important to know what makes you feel like you again. In times of extreme stress, it's easy to forget. Grief and anger have a way of turning off the logical side of your brain, so you need to have your contingency set in advance.

When she lost her husband, Joan Didion tore through medical literature to understand how and why her husband died. "Information is control," she repeated to herself.

When Arnold Schwarzenegger looks back at his youth, he always recalls the critical role that working out played in his life: "It was like therapy for me. Even when I couldn't sleep, I would go to the gym and lift weights until I was exhausted."

What's most interesting to me is how different each of these protocols is. While Joan seeks control through information, Arnold and Esther are trying to do the exact opposite. They are trying to clear their heads of everything, leaving themselves with only the present moment.

But ultimately, that's where we all want to end up. When I finish writing, I do my best to leave the feelings on the page. Otherwise, it would be a redundant and torturous exercise if I had to carry it everywhere with me.

How do you get back to feeling like yourself?

A hot bath?

A long run?

A cold shower?

If you're not sure what it is, I'm begging you to find out.

It's like insurance - it's one of those things you don't think you'll need until everything goes wrong.

So, what's your hot bath?